NO RIGHTS, NO WOMEN by H&C Leo Burnett Beirut for NO RIGHTS, NO WOMEN

The Print Ad titled NO RIGHTS, NO WOMEN was done by H&C Leo Burnett Beirut advertising agency for product: PRESSURE GROUP FIGHTING FOR WOMEN’S RIGHTS (brand: NO RIGHTS, NO WOMEN) in Lebanon. It was released in Jun 2012.

Describe the campaign/entry
By Lebanese law, men and women are not equal. The discriminatory laws reduce women to 'half citizens'. If it takes a man to become a full citizen, so be it!

We started online, asking women to add moustaches to their profile pictures and change their gender, to become men. The complex discriminatory laws were simplified into statements to be shared, and an online petition was circulated.

NGOs, activists, reporters, bloggers, students and artists, helped build hype by generating their own content.

On March 8th, International Women's Day, women dressed as men and took the movement from the virtual world to the real one. By nightfall, 20 metres away from parliament, the movement was joined by hundreds of other women.

The event made it to the opening of the 8 o'clock news on leading local and Arab channels.

We received international exposure featuring in magazines, radios, newspapers, as well as numerous regional and international blogs and websites.

The movement got US$1.2m of free media coverage.

On August 4th 2011, i.e., 7 months after the start of the 'No Rights No women' movement, the Honour Crimes Law was abolished.

The Domestic Violence law is now in final study by the parliament.

Describe the brief from the client
We discovered that very few Lebanese women knew how discriminated they were by the law, and that even fewer measures were being taken by the government to change their situation.

We wanted the Lebanese community and the lawmakers to imagine a world without women, in hopes that something would change. We named both the movement and the campaign 'No Rights, No Women'.

Results

We were featured in:

Over 20 leading regional magazines and newspapers

Over 57 international blogs and websites

Top 3 local and Arab channels

The movement got US$1.2m of free media coverage. (Stat - IPSOS)

Our Facebook page was viewed over 16,700 times in only 1 week

On August 4th 2011, i.e., 7 months after the start of the 'No Rights No women' movement, The Honour Crimes Law was abolished.

The Domestic Violence law is now in final study by the parliament.

Creative Execution

We started 4 weeks before International Women’s Day, by asking women to add moustaches to their profile pictures and to change their gender on Facebook.

The complex discriminatory laws, which were widely unknown, were simplified into statements that could be shared as statuses, posts and tweets.

Local and regional bloggers, became instantly intrigued by 'the women with moustaches', and wrote about the cause, helping create hype for the event.

Our page became 1) a forum uniting NGOs, activists and Lebanese women from around the world and 2) a 'gallery' of user generated content inspired by the campaign.

On March 8th, we took the movement to the real world. That morning, women went out dressed as men. Corporations and universities woke up to offices with no women. By nightfall, 20 metres away from parliament, hundreds of women came together to walk for equality.

We were approached by a group of Lebanese women fighting for women’s rights, to create a campaign for their new organization.

By Lebanese law, men and women are not equal. Lebanese women have no right to pass their nationality to their children. They have no custody rights. There is no law that protects women against domestic violence.

We wanted to quickly engage a large amount of people, by creating a simple act that would generate maximum impact. We wanted women to give up their 'womanship' to claim their citizenship, by becoming 'men'.

The digital platform was the starting point and the most engaging field of the campaign. Social Media was the ultimate tool to raise awareness about our cause and to involve the biggest number of people.

A tangible physical act had to follow in order to shock but also to attract Media, as well as all online platforms, so that from a small initiative our campaign could reach national and even an international scale.